http://www.spacedaily.com/index.html Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST en-us NASA has successfully concluded a remotely controlled test of new technologies that would empower future space robots to transfer hazardous oxidizer - a type of propellant - into the tanks of satellites in space today. Concurrently on the ground, NASA is incorporating results from this test and the Robotic Refueling Mission on the International Space Station to prepare for an upcoming grou]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST The head of Russia's space agency Roscosmos said Tuesday that developing technologies for robotic exploration of the moon and Mars is a priority. Oleg Ostapenko said in an interview with state newspaper Rossiiskaya Gazeta that the agency would boost its unmanned space probe efforts ahead of three missions to the moon. The first mission, the long-delayed Luna-25, is slated to launch i]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Opportunity is exploring 'Murray Ridge' on Solander Point, part of the rim of Endeavour Crater. The rover continues to investigate the region called 'Cook Haven.' On Sol 3576 (Feb. 13, 2014), the rover completed the in-situ (contact) investigation of the rock target, called 'Stuart Island' with another Microscopic Imager (MI) mosaic and a placement of the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer ]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Russia's space agency, Roscosmos, will send three automated rovers to the moon from 2016 to 2019 as part of its plan to eventually send a manned mission to Mars, according to agency head Oleg Ostapenko. "Stage one priority is research projects to be carried out by automated rovers on the moon and Mars," Ostapenko told Rossiyskaya Gazeta in an interview that will be published on Wednesday. ]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST China is expected to launch an upper stage aircraft this year that can be used as a "space shuttle bus" to propel payload in space, a senior official in charge of rocket research said Monday. The Yuanzheng-1 (Expedition-1) upper stage aircraft, attached with a carrier rocket, can carry aircraft using its own power system after reaching an initial orbit, said Liang Xiaohong, Party secretary]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST University of Arizona researchers snapped images of a planet outside our solar system with an Earth-based telescope using essentially the same type of imaging sensor found in digital cameras instead of an infrared detector. Although the technology still has a very long way to go, the accomplishment takes astronomers a small step closer to what will be needed to image earth-like planets around ot]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST This new Hubble image shows spiral galaxy ESO 137-001, framed against a bright background as it moves through the heart of galaxy cluster Abell 3627. This cluster is violently ripping the spiral's entrails out into space, leaving bright blue streaks as telltale clues to this cosmic crime. This new Hubble image shows ESO 137-001, a galaxy located in the southern constellation of Triangulum ]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Ten years ago, we knew Titan as a fuzzy orange ball about the size of Mercury. We knew it had a nitrogen atmosphere - the only known world with a thick nitrogen atmosphere besides Earth. But what might lie beneath the hazy air was still just a guess. On March 6, NASA's Cassini spacecraft will swoop down within 933 miles (1,500 kilometers) of Titan to conduct its 100th flyby of the Saturn ]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Astronomers have used NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Space Agency's (ESA's) XMM-Newton to show a supermassive black hole six billion light years from Earth is spinning extremely rapidly. This first direct measurement of the spin of such a distant black hole is an important advance for understanding how black holes grow over time. Black holes are defined by just two simpl]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST On March 3, 2014, at 6:09 a.m. EST, a NASA-funded sounding rocket launched straight into an aurora over Venetie, Alaska. The Ground-to-Rocket Electrodynamics - Electron Correlative Experiment, or GREECE, sounding rocket mission, which launched from Poker Flat Research Range in Poker Flat, Alaska, will study classic curls in the aurora in the night sky. "The conditions were optimal," said M]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Astronomers searching for clues about dark energy, the mysterious force that is speeding up the expansion of the Universe, have uncovered new evidence about the nature of supernovae, finding many are lighter than scientists had expected. The findings, from an international team from the Nearby Supernova Factory project, overturn previous understanding of white dwarf stars and raise new que]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST A new innovative instrument called MUSE (Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer) has been successfully installed on ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the Paranal Observatory in northern Chile. MUSE has observed distant galaxies, bright stars and other test targets during the first period of very successful observations. Following testing and preliminary acceptance in Europe in September 2013,]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST The spiral galaxy ESO 137-001 looks like a dandelion caught in a breeze in this new composite image from the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope. The galaxy is zooming toward the upper left of this image, in between other galaxies in the Norma cluster located over 200 million light-years away. The road is harsh: intergalactic gas in the Norma cluster is sparse, but so ]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd and the Surrey Space Centre are celebrating a remarkable thirty years of in-orbit operations from one of its earliest satellites, UoSAT-2, which was launched on a Delta rocket on 1st March 1984 from the Vandenberg Air Force Base in the USA. UoSAT-2, the second satellite in a long history of 41 missions launched by SSTL to date, has always held a special sign]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST South Africa's first nano- satellite experienced two very close encounters with defunct satellites in the past few days after three months in orbit, authorities said on Monday. The nano-satellite, the ZACUBE-1, came within an estimated 185m of the defunct Russian COSMOS 2151 satellite over Antarctica on Wednesday, the South African Department of Science and Technology (SADST) said in a sta]]> Sun, 09 MAR 2014 22:16:13 AEST